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So, I've been working on my own game, and with a failure to gather other artists to do this for me, I took the matter into my own hands, expecting my terrible drawing skills to show themselves once more and that my fakedex would never reach completion until I got a job so I'd be able to pay someone to draw for me.

But then I surprised myself. It actually turned out very well. Most of the time. I had some fun throwing my scrapped ideas into the trash bin across the room, but I finally got the starters down.

001Ceratal
The Petal Crown Pokémon
(Grass)
[Ceratal tests its strength by tackling trees. With years of doing this, its head has become very hard and calloused.]

Evolves at Level 18

"This, honestly, is the best one I've done so far. Closely. Maybe second best. But it's still the first one I did. I actually had his idea floating around in my head for a long time, and a while back, I did a prototype sketch and went over the lines in Paint.
I redid it while sitting in class, and scanned it in at home. I now use GIMP, and with layer capability and antialiasing, it made the quality significantly better. I also redid the design. I used an art tutorial which is actually for making pony vectors, but I translated it into Pokémon usage. I also looked at some of the official artworks, and got a basic idea on how to do it. And Ceratal was born."

002Trileaf
The Petal Crown Pokémon
(Grass)
[Insert Dex Entry Here]

Evolves at Level 35

"I did this after I finished the other two starters. And I hate the shading, and I just can't get the coloring right. And its shape is just so odd. I can't seem to match the little nuances that I made with Ceratal that made it so great. I personally think it looked much better as a sketch, and maybe as the lineart.
I did this one sitting at home, on my desk. I was playing paper basketball with all the bad drawings where I couldn't get the shape right. I looked at other people's fakemons on DeviantArt just so I could have a reference and get the shape right. And although it's fine, I still hate the coloring. But since it's going to be in a game, it's the sprite that matters. I'll probably redo the shading and colors at some point."

"Yay! It won a contest! I'm actually good at this! I still think I might be off a bit on the shading. Ah well."

004Kitturn
The Ember Cat Pokémon
(Fire)
[Insert Dex Entry Here]

Evolves at Level 17

"Everyone loves cats, right? This is the internet, after all. Kitturn also had a prototype sketch, but I've since lost it. I never scanned it in, so I don't know where the paper went. Anyways, Kitturn has fur, so she was a lot more difficult to shade, so I was like 'Eh, okay.' Still, it's pretty good, but it lost some quality on the lines when I sized it down. The eyes also gave me some trouble, what with its odd and empty coloring."

005Pyline
The Incense Pokémon
(Fire/Dark)
[Insert Dex Entry Here]

Evolves at Level 36

"Oh my god Pyline is so beautiful. I have no words.
...

Yes I do. The shading on her is actually well done, in my opinion. The coloring took a few tries, and in the process, I found and absolutely beautiful shiny that you don't get to see yet. Hah. But really, she's just so amazing. Although I have yet to make good fire. I've never drawn good fire before. Anyway, it took a while to get her face to be the right shape. More specifically, the ears. And her eyes seem a bit wonky. But overall, I feel she is my best or second best."

006Insashe
The Incense Pokémon
(Fire/Dark)
[Insert Dex Entry Here]

Does not evolve

"Smoke, smoke, beautiful smoke. THAT FRICKIN BURNER ON ITS TAIL I HATE IT. It still looks weird. Actually, the tail in general is just shaped weird. Blech. Everything else is good in my eyes. At one point, I contemplated having it as a Fire/Ghost type, but then that would give it too far an advantage over the other two."

007Sylvisud
The Bubble Rabbit Pokémon
(Water)
[Insert Dex Entry Here]

Evolves at Level 17

"Paper basketball again? At least I got a good score. I went through so many designs for the water starter. I had such a hard time coming up with a decent design that fit the theme of water starters. Originally, it was a narwhal, but it didn't fit, so I scrapped it and began wasting paper. I kept looking up semi aquatic animals, but I had a hard time picking one that I could use that wasn't a platypus. It was originally a deer, and so I sketched that out, but I hated it, so I scrapped that. I looked at the page another time, and one stood out: Marsh rabbit. Well, rabbit, specifically. So that's where Sylvisud came from. I had a lot of difficulty coming up with a decent rabbit design, and at one point, I think I ended up with a Pikachu clone. Oops. After a lot of paper, I came up with a final design."

008Bubbunch
The Bubble Rabbit Pokémon
(Water)
[Insert Dex Entry Here]

Evolves at Level 36

"I don't really like how this one turned out. It looks kind of... acrylic almost. The shading, in my opinion, is terrible. The lineart is just as bad, and it almost looks like a colored blob. I think I also made the shading too soft on this one as well. Although I do really like the bubbles. "

009Antylago
The Washing Pokémon
(Water/Psychic)
[Its arms have become so heavy that it must use psychic power to move them.]

Does not evolve

"I based this one, name and design, off of one of my favorite Digimon, "Antylamon." This actually ended up becoming one of my favorites, although bits of the shading still bother me somewhat.

those are really good! they look really realistic. i do agree with you on how you say the first one is the best because it is! the outline is done very smoothly. also, the light shading done on the petal crown makes it looks nice. the shading done on his knees also helps.
i think kitturn needs more work because of the outline isn't as smooth, but i think it is because of the fur effect that you're going for. you can always try to make the outline more smooth and then shade in some fur which might make it look more nice. also, i think the eyes need more shading because it just looks like big shapes to me.
nicely done, can't wait to see more.

I think you sort of covered everything you needed to change or improve on in your own descriptions, tbh. The one comment I can make overall, is to make sure you add equal amount of shading too all parts of the Pokemon. For instance, all of them are shaded out pretty well, but you don't add any shading in the eyes so they end up looking flat when compared to the rest of the Pokemon. Like xxkaylabby said before, Kitturn suffers from this lack of depth the most.

Overall though, your concepts are very strong! As long as you pay attention to your positioning and anatomy [which clearly you are from what I gather from your comments], you'll be well on your way! Good luck on your game, I hope that works out well for you! Can't wait to see the completed dex ;)

I still love them; the Dinosuar look just makes me think of the baby dinosuar from Banjo tooie, its like just awesome and done very well. The cat seems a little generic but still really cool, and I can only imagine what the final one could end up being, you could make it engulfed completely in fire, or maybe ghost fire and have it be a charred skeleton with flames, the possibilities are endless. and finally I just love water types >.< especially cut little guys like that! he's definitly my favorite, its just completely adorable, but the second one looks strange, i cant really tell what you're going for, but its kinda because of the pose, it leaves more questions than answers hahahaha, but I'm really excited for the final evolutions!! you did a great job on all of them, especially considering you arent a professional artist! You totally could have fooled me! The only thing I wanna see is how you make them into Pokémon sprites to be used in a game ;D
Now that would be something worth seeing
Good luck!

Really liking what I'm seeing here, to be honest! You've got some really good designs with some really nice shading there. But, like others probably said, the only main aspect I can see you working on to improve on them is the anatomy. Won't really be talking about the whole body but more about stuff that stick out to me in particular. For example, when I see Ceratal, I see a really nicely designed fakemon with an odd tail. Everything feels just right except the tail. To be honest, it just doesn't look natural because the curve isn't smooth enough, if that makes any sense. Kitturn's pose is really well done but here, yet again, I find the tail to be a little odd. I wish I had a tablet so I could've expressed myself better by telling you where exactly I think you went wrong but oh well. I really think you could benefit a bit from practicing tails more, no matter how silly that might sound. Apart from them lacking the proper curves that make them look unnatural right now, I also think that they're pretty much there just for the sake of it. I think you could make a little more creative use of them, to be honest. They might as well be playing around with their tails in some of the art or stuff like that, y'know. But that's not as important, I guess. Just throwing it out there as I think it might help you out as far as dynamic poses are concerned.

Also, I think Ceratal could've looked a little better if you extended the green part to a little further on the tail but that probably ain't what you intended so I wouldn't go there. But yes, as Alexial stated, I think you ought to work on adding depth to the eyes. Everything's just so well done here that the flat eyes stick out like a sore thumb. Especially in the case of Kitturn and its evolution.

Anyway, good stuff. Will be glad to see more of your works in the future man. Before I depart, I'd just throw in another thought - The shading in most of your works look as if they're composed of different phases. The transition between the light and the dark areas of certain areas of body parts do not feel as smooth as they should. You actually took care of it in the last fakemon. If I were you, I'd emulate that kind of shading in my future works.

Your imitation of Sugimori's style is good, but there are a few areas that need some work. Such as anatomy, but that has been mentioned in the thread before, so I won't be bothering with it. Your shading is messy and a bit too dark. I would recommend shading with a dark color such as dark blue or a purplish hue of black. Once you've finished shading, set the layer opacity to 50% and the shading should look much better. Well, based on my own experience anyways.

Next, is the overall shading.

You've got the hang of shading, but I'd advise you pick a light source and go with it the entire picture. Judging by most of your works, you've done that but look at Abscitops' visible hind leg. Its armor shading and hide shading don't match up and it looks... awkward, in a sense. Do keep in mind the highlights you're using; don't abuse them and make sure they're not... glaringly obvious. I would suggest(if you don't already do so) giving the highlights their own layer and then lowering the opacity of the said layer. It will give your highlighting some translucency and will give a better effect.

When doing fire, don't outline it in black. Give it more of a reddish orange color, it will look better. Trust me. Do keep in mind the details on your fakes, too. Pokémon has a very simplistic style, it's not like Digimon. Kitturn's fur detail is pushing it a bit, but it isn't excessive. Insashe's tail is an example of what I mean. It alone is more than enough detail for the entire fake. Regardless, it is your fake so you have free reign to do what you will. I am only giving suggestions, and I wish you luck on your game.

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